micro:bit Beta Testing Programme

Do you enjoy finding bugs and suggesting improvements? Then we and the entire micro:bit community need your help!

The Foundation is committed to producing the very best software and hardware that inspires every child. We can only do that by getting feedback on the things we're making.

If you take on the challenge and become a micro:bit tester, you'll have the power to shape the tools we make: fix things that don't work for you, improve the instructions and documentation, and suggest ideas we'd never even have thought of.

To get started as a tester, sign up to the mailing list by clicking the button below, and we'll start telling you about all the latest software before we release it to the rest of the world. Please note that the beta testing programme is only open to those 13 and over.

Flashing the micro:bit directly with WebUSB

We can program the micro:bit directly from the editors, without the drag-and-drop step you're used to!

You can receive serial communication from the micro:bit directly to the browser. This will be really useful for things like Python where the 'REPL' is an important part of learning to code, but currently isn't available in the online editor at python.microbit.org.

webUSB is an emerging web standard that lets the browser (where our micro:bit editors normally run) talk directly to devices using USB. As the micro:bit works using USB, it's possible to upgrade the 'interface firmware' on the micro:bit in order to give
it new webUSB powers. This is all quite new technology, and so there are a few rough edges.

At the moment, only Chrome supports webUSB.

What we need to test:

As this process requires a micro:bit firmware upgrade, we need to test that the instructions for updating the firmware are clear. We want to test webUSB on as many
different systems as we can, and find out whether the instructions are clear. We aren't yet looking for feedback on the way that we initiate webUSB connections in the editors -- the user interface that we're showing during the testing programme is not
final and we expect to create something smoother during the beta period. When you sign up, you'll get a detailed list of instructions for testing.

Python Editor micropython v1

What we need to test:

We would like you to try your biggest and most complex programs/.hex files in the beta editor to make sure they work the way you expect them to. We'd particularly like to hear about your experience with:

Accelerometer gestures (tilt, shake etc.)

Programs that change the configuration of the same pin more than once, for example pin0 used as a digital-output and analog-read or pwm/music/speech/etc